


Belonging

by Miri1984



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, so much fluff oh my god
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-01-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:54:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22223653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miri1984/pseuds/Miri1984
Summary: Zolf comes home in the rain.
Relationships: Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde
Comments: 8
Kudos: 118





	Belonging

**Author's Note:**

  * For [snarkbunny (bittercape)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bittercape/gifts).



Zolf was pretty sure Poseidon did it on purpose.

There were side effects from breaking up with a god, of course there were, aside from losing the legs, and one of them was the fucking weather. 

It happened when he was on his own. Possibly because the other gods got shitty with Poseidon for doing it to their worshippers when he wasn’t. Those three weeks they spent with Ed and Tjelvar in France had been blissfully sunny the entire time. Apparently not even the big watery git was willing to rain on Ed’s particular shiny parade of utter devotion. Additionally, spending any time with Azu seemed to mitigate it as well, the only kinds of rain they got when she and Hamid visited tended to be the light misting kind, the kind that caught in Hamid’s hair and made it catch the light in delicate fractals, the kind that sparked rainbows and petrichor and the awareness of crops being gently watered.

Sickeningly cute. Or heart wrenchingly romantic. Zolf had always had difficulty separating his reactions properly when it came to those two. It was very different, seeing it in fiction, to seeing it in reality.

No, it was when Zolf was on his own, preferably  _ entirely _ on his own, that Poseidon figured it was okay to slam him with the kind of storm that nearly killed them on the channel. 

The rain drove into the ground like arrows. It was at least twenty minutes walk back to the cottage.

“You got too many ideas from that damned squid,” Zolf muttered, as he trudged his way through the Irish mud, back towards their cottage. There was a roll of thunder, and he had a sudden all senses memory of being flung from the top of the tower at Shoin’s island. 

That storm hadn’t been Poseidon, though, as throwing lightning bolts around tended to infringe on certain other gods’ intellectual property, so Zolf was relatively certain he wasn’t in any actual danger, aside from the water dripping down the back of his neck behind the upturned collar of his coat and soaking into his beard.

He focused on where he was going, back to the home he and Oscar had made for themselves, it’s stone floor covered with thick rugs pressed on them by Hamid in Cairo, the huge leather armchair that sat next to the wide open fireplace, the little souvenirs Oscar couldn’t stop himself from picking up whenever they traveled, touches of his humanity that were more than enough to make it feel like home and not just somewhere he lived.

He’d never really understood that, the need to collect things, although thinking back on it, his parents had done the same. There simply wasn’t enough space for it, on the sea, and Poseidon wasn’t interested in decorating.

Oscar would ask, why he didn’t, why their home was all Oscar and no Zolf, and he hadn’t quite gotten to the point where he could articulate.

He didn’t need to, when Oscar did it. Home, for him, was where Oscar was. 

_ (And late at night, Oscar would whisper to him, how he was enough personality in an allbeit small package to take up more space than every lamp and figurine that littered their shelves, than any piece of crockery or wonky portrait or literary award, that Oscar would burn it all and run if it meant they could be together, and that was more than enough.) _

He walked under the bows of the big spreading oak tree that was the last landmark on the road before home, just as a gust of wind decided to dump an enormous load of water caught in its leaves down the back of his neck.

“Fuck you, Poseidon,” he muttered, under his breath, and continued to trudge through the mud.

He’d had worse.

He’d had so much worse.

Also, he couldn’t help it, the fact that Poseidon was such a petty bastard gave him a lot of life. 

_ “Maybe you’re not the cleric of hope,” Oscar had said to him, back when they’d cared about where his power came from, back when Zolf hadn’t been sure the way he was now.  _

_ Zolf had raised his hands and tried to cast spark on Oscar’s tie. Oscar had dispelled it, because that was how they did things, back then. When they were dancing around feelings and incompatibilities and idiocy.  _

_ “Well where does that come from then?” he’d said. _

_ Oscar had smiled, and his eyes had been warm, and Zolf had felt a jolt of something in his chest that wasn’t irritation. At least, not exactly. _

_ “Maybe you’re the cleric of spite.” _

_ “Who does things out of spite?” _

_ “Me for one,” Oscar had smoothed a hand through his hair and shrugged. “Some of my best work has come from that over abundant wellspring of inspiration.” _

_ “I don’t work like that.” _

_ Oscar had tilted his head, and the smile had turned soft. Softer than Zolf had ever seen it. _

_ “No,” he’d said. “I don’t think you do.” _

Finally, there was the gate, and the front path, and Oscar’s abortive attempts at a vegetable patch. Gods knew the man had absolutely no idea how seeds were supposed to be spaced or germinated or whatever it was they were supposed to do in the ground once you put them there and in the end it had become a patch of indeterminate green mess that sometimes, on a good day obviously not dictated by seasons or effort, sprouted a single strawberry. Zolf had threatened to pull it all up more than once but Oscar was so proud every time he presented Zolf with one of the wilted, pale berries on his breakfast plate that Zolf didn’t have the heart to follow through.

It was pretty much a swamp right now, though, and Zolf was too wet and too tired to care whether whatever fruit or vegetable bearing plants in it were drowning in the current downpour.

Instead he pushed open the door and was immediately greeted with a wave of warmth and light and that particular smell of home that sank into his bones and made the water down the back of his neck and the long trudge through the mud immediately start to fade into unimportance.

“Boots!” he heard Oscar call from the living room and Zolf almost smiled to himself as he busied himself with removing them. He didn’t favour the ridiculous eighteen hole monstrosities that Oscar had taken to wearing (Zolf literally did not have the calves for them, although he certainly appreciated that Oscar did) but it took a little time to unlace his own and slip his feet into the hand-sewn leather slippers Hamid had made back when they first noticed naked metal played havoc on wooden floors.

He removed his coat and hung it on the peg, smoothed a hand through his wet hair and made his way into the living room.

Oscar was ensconced by the fire, a throw rug over his lap, the firelight glinting in the auburn highlights of his hair, a book open on his lap. 

Zolf didn’t bother to try to discern the title. They didn’t share tastes in literature, as a rule. Oscar read to improve himself, or to catch up on gossip, or to criticise. He rarely read for pure enjoyment, except on those special occasions when he cradled Zolf’s head in his lap and carded one hand through the mess of white hair and scar tissue at his temple and performed Campbell’s novels for Zolf with note-perfect voices…

… Zolf was happy to acknowledge that those sessions were as much for Zolf’s enjoyment as Oscar’s. And that was part of the reason he stopped in the doorway to their living room and leaned against its frame, despite the damp and cold in his bones, despite the ache in the joints of his prosthetics, despite everything. He could take a moment to admire Oscar, comfortable, safe, content, in their home.

In their  _ home. _

Oscar looked up and caught his eyes, and smiled. “Gods you look drowned,” he said. 

“Been more drowned in my time,” Zolf said. 

Oscar held a hand. “Come on let’s dry you off, sailor. Don’t want you going rusty.”

Zolf sucked in a breath through his nose, then stepped forward into the warmth and light, content that he was where he belonged.


End file.
